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It was the beautiful timeless period of our misty childhood at the beginning of the century (20th). How strongly we believed in the renaissance we felt it rather than understood it. But before we could really look at the world around us, all our securities and ideas were shattered to pieces, to pieces. Our entire Old World was blown away by the hot raging winds of newly arisen nations and class systems. At the same time the old Jewish self-sufficiency and autonomy collapsed into the dust in front of our eyes. After that everything seemed without mercy, without roots.
In our minds we still lived as in the past, as if everything was secure, safe, worthwhile and would permanently remain in its place.
How can one wipe out of one's memory the medium sized provincial city with its riverside streets, the noisy timber houses, the wide branched family trees, the 'Parisian' Jews, the prestigious Jews, the wealthy merchants and businessmen, and the sturdy peasants? Jewish families had already begun to divide due to their political differences. At first in the tradesmen's own synagogues they would slowly distance themselves from the denseness of their family opinions and ideas on life, and hope that the sunlight would be let in on their own poor dark streets. These were the same underground dreams that surged through the great Jewish domain of Poland to Western Russia.
Spring had arrived in our poor Jewish streets. From the distant smoking factories of the industrial cities and the centres of Russian Jewish life, the first messengers arrived like swallows. The forbidden pamphlets printed on tissue paper the first strike for a 10-hour working day, the longhaired intelligentsia in their satin shirts and the orthodox youths with their black ringlets behind their ears, together with other romantic types of Polish and Russian revolutionaries who trod the snow bound tracks to Siberia in those stormy years. It was our own I.L. Peretz who wrote: the spring was not far away, although the sky was still dark and overcast, and the wind whistled and roared. How beautiful was our belief then.
Orthodox Jews were still praying to their old God of the past. We still married our children as if their future was secure. On our poor Jewish streets they built another storey, another storey, and another attic with a window. We quarrelled; the old branches of many families were split over our collapsing inheritance. We would quarrel over a small plot of land, over rusty old jewellery and ornaments, and exhausted ourselves with our underhand dealings and trading. The Tsarist satraps (rulers) from the lowest guardsman up to the district governor were slipped secret bribe money in order to survive. They were easily bribed they preferred to do business with Jews, who understood dealing in secret, as they had to live their whole lives secretly.
On sunlit mornings when those romantics who ardently believed in a new dawn would sing the heart- warming prayer songs - tailors, shoemakers, carpenters, blacksmiths, the leatherworkers, everywhere there was longing, expressed in the melodies of the yeshiva students. They would come out of the strictly orthodox prayer houses of the mitnagdim and make their meagre livelihoods in the wooden stalls and workshops of the side streets and alleys in the shadows of the large city buildings. Brest was famous for it's diligent working-class people; it's wagon drivers, porters, the bosses and their apprentices. They would drink their thick black tea, played with stones and dominos, and accompany their masters to the study house where they would hear a learned man. The educated people would read Hasphira and dream of returning to Zion. The newly arisen wealthy Jewish merchants and prominent men had fashioned a world in which they would sit on the balconies of their newly built houses facing the river on warm summer days, drinking tea with jam from their samovars with their best festive glasses. They would also smell the flowers and trees in the King's Gardens, and the aromas from the coffee houses where the clerical and office workers would congregate. Many deals were made around those tables.
The bustling main street was lined with acacia and chestnut trees that grew in profusion. Over the past decades from the time that it was decided to rebuild the old fortress, and to build railway lines through the city that was situated on the border of Poland and Russia, Brest had become an important hub of commerce and business.
All the trains laden with the golden wheat from the Ukraine went through Brest, pigskins and smoked food from the Pinsk district and further away in Russia. Overnight the newly enriched Jewish merchants became tycoons they were the suppliers and wholesale merchants, and they also founded dynasties. In essence they thought that they were building upon secure foundations and for all eternity. The rouble was a strong currency, and the shine of the heavy gold pieces that they earned gave one a sense of self-confidence and security.
On both sides of the boulevard that was the main Warsaw- Moscow road there were large three storey brick buildings (higher than legally permitted due to the fortress), built in a mixture of Imperialist and Renaissance styles, with carved statues of athletic naked men and half dressed women, their private parts modestly covered by fig leafs, their huge muscles supporting the balconies.
The deep basements and large storerooms were tightly packed with stock the wholesale stores were full of agricultural supplies and machinery, iron goods, clothing, manufactured goods, and especially the supplies for the military. Elegant shops with fruits and cakes, teahouses that had cool room cellars, and low ceilinged rooms with gypsy musicians playing their guitars. Situated on a corner of a busy street was the 'Lotus of Cairo' hall that was the first Brest cinema, where the first silent movies were shown.
In the blue summer evenings the boulevards and the alleys, the square at Domski Plaza the city elite would sit in the arbours between the trees to listen to the summer theatre music in the King's garden, accompanied by sprightly young men with waxed moustaches. Hardened waiters would mind their walking sticks and their dogs stiff officers with their finely dressed ladies, high school youths in their uniforms, army cadets in their brass buttoned uniforms and the wide brimmed hats, would all promenade back and forth in noisy groups. The girls would admiringly recite excerpts from Pushkin and Lermentov. Groups of workers and tradesmen would congregate around the benches on the boulevard, or down towards the river on corners where their hushed murmurings would be heard, and the muffled sounds of their forbidden revolutionary songs. From the tea houses and their overhanging balconies came the sounds of Gypsy violins and guitars playing Ochi Chornaya and Heyda Troika.
It would happen that even on a Friday night or on the Sabbath, long convoys of military wagons would arrive at the Jewish owned stores and warehouses on the Nevski Prospect the soldiers and officers would enter the courtyards to quickly load up the wagons, there would be much shouting together with the neighing noises from the horses, and the gleaming of swords. But the narrow wooden Jewish streets near the river and the fish market were all quiet in the hard earned Jewish Sabbath.
1937 was one of the most critical years since the end of the First World War. The reactionary Polish government had tried hard to ruin the small Jewish businessmen and traders with their little market stalls. They tried to push the Jewish students out of the universities and the Jewish workers out of the factories. They therefore had a special interest in inciting a pogrom-like atmosphere against Jews.
In Brest the atmosphere was also tense. The officially sanctioned and protected anti Semitic campaign sought to provoke the Jewish population, but did not have much material to proceed with. The groups of Jewish unemployed would gather at street corners and discuss the current situation. The main question was, why did they not organize any resistance? Why did they allow themselves to be beaten and their faces spat on? They had been driven from their work and trades. The clear answer that arose was that they could certainly protect themselves from the wild gangs of anti Semitic hooligans, but they could not protect themselves from the Polish police, who supported the aggressive hooligans and would arrest and bring to trial any Jew who put up some resistance.
Unbelievable even for the fascistic government that ruled Poland at that time until the 15th May 1937 arrived. The Brest Jewish community was innocently drawn into a provocation that gave the fascist organized gangs the opportunity carry out a pogrom.
What happened? A Jewish butcher at the New Market stalls could no longer tolerate the repression and the constant sucking out of monies by corrupt police officials taking bribes to overlook the fact that his earnings were not entirely legal (above the meat quota). This Jewish butcher took the right to avenge himself with his sharp knife. The same sharp knife that cut the illegal meat that he sold. This same sharp knife rightfully avenged the policeman's crooked dealings. It was a simple murder the result of tense circumstances but the anti Semitic Polish leaders used this incident as a pretext to stir up the gentile Polish population. All Brest Jews must pay for the butcher's crime (the murder of a police agent) with their 'fortunes' and their blood. Previously organized groups of hoodlums arrived at the New Market with deafening anti Semitic chanting and surrounded the entire area around the market we must take the Jew's possessions they belong to us. Nobody will stop us, the police are with us and are our supporters. The peasants danced for joy as the pimps, prostitutes and thieves gathered with the intent of looting, robbery and murder.
When these evil-minded gangs felt that they had police protection, the looting and destruction began.
Under a half disguised directive from the police they tore off the nailed and shuttered doors of shops and houses and went on a 24-hour rampage of looting and destruction of Jewish assets. What they could not destroy was thrown into the middle of the street so that the Polish gentiles could take it for their own use. The looting and destruction began at the New Market. Under police sanction, shouting and laughing, they entered Jewish factories, homes and shops after breaking the locks and breaking down the doors, smashing the shutters and the glass windows. Mountains of goods were thrown into the street where they were trampled on and picked through by strangers with dirty hands, who made them into bundles and happily took them home.
The pogrom hooligans and their followers lost no time as the order to loot and murder was only for 24 hours, and the Jewish assets were so large. After they finished at the new Market they spread to the 3rd of May St. and then to Dabrowska St. Then they marched down toward the Old Market to the shops and stalls surrounding the market. At this market there was talk of resistance by the porters and wagon drivers, and the strong young men, who tried to organize themselves, but the police immediately warned them not to remain on the streets or they would be arrested. They scattered them away whenever they saw small group gathering.
The wild vandals arrived with the same destructive intent. They wanted to win over the Belorussians peasants who happened to be at the market in large numbers as it was a market day. However, in the majority the Belorussians peasants did not allow themselves to be drawn into the criminal anti Semitic activity, and quickly harnessed their horses to their wagons and fled back to their villages.
As the market was emptied of peasants, the hooligan numbers were diminished as their followers were already laden with stolen goods. The remaining wild animals began to fear that their numbers were too small and their activities abated however, several Jewish shops and dozens of stalls were overturned and looted, and several Jewish heads were beaten with hard rocks. Thus ended their dirty work at the Old Market.
Jews began to emerge from behind locked doors and their hiding places to see if they could safely go home to their wives and families, and to see if the murderous thugs had reached their homes. But the tragic spectacle were not yet over the hooligans began to show themselves with their openly Nazi faces the spilt Jewish blood had given them the courage to reveal themselves in their ugly nakedness. With the Nazi swastikas worn publicly on the right side of their chests they became even more brazen and audacious. They began to organize themselves into groups for further looting and violence, as the taste of Jewish blood had excited them - the criminals prepared for greater exploits.
With nightfall, the shameful dark night of the 16th May, the wild animals fouled the fresh May air. The streets and parks were empty of any people the police prevented any Jewish resistance - they had ordered that the filthy work of the hooligans should continue. They chased every Jew into their homes - the reign of fear, terror and dread from the entire day's events causing them to lock and barricade their doors, put out any lights and fearfully await any more horrors that the night might bring. Screams and crying mixed with the wild shouts of the rampaging beasts were heard from every street - bedding of a workers family was slashed and the feathers thrown into the street. In the food store, barrels of herrings were smashed and thrown into the streets, torn sacks of food, all broken and mixed together lay in the streets.
Further along the broken workshop of a tradesman his tools and instruments smashed, his crying wife and children all beaten up, so the wild looting and destruction continued through the night.
Every Jewish family huddled in their barricaded homes or where the hooligan's hands could not reach them their spirits greatly depressed and fearing for their lives and that they would never see their loved ones again. Jewish neighbours from the same building huddled together, waiting impatiently for the dawn and the horrors of the night to end. The first rays of daylight that penetrated through the closed shutters brings the hope that perhaps this is the end of the mayhem perhaps the unprotected Jews of Poland can overcome this problem of those that want to build bridges between Poland and Nazi Germany. The day brought hope after the dark night and singly the Jews crept out of their homes to see the extent of the shameful barbarity against civilized society. They now stood in the open air of the streets and heard the accounts of the past days events. There had been several stabbings, causing subsequent fatalities. Many were wounded; Jewish stores, shops, homes, and factories plundered and destroyed, windows and doors smashed, Jewish synagogues, prayer houses and cultural centres destroyed. Many Jews who had tried to resist or protect their assets were arrested.
The city of Brest resembled an old ashamed Jewish mother who had endured much pain in her life from violence, wars, destruction and fires, and who emerged from all the suffering with strength and radiance. Now she seemed to say to us: don't lose heart my beloved decent, unemployed, Jewish inhabitants, this will all pass. Although they robbed us, shamed and beat us, and left their bloody marks on us, all this will pass and be all right. Brest together with its Jewish inhabitants will once again grow out of the ruins, larger and more beautiful than before. And thus it was.
Jewish communities around the world immediately responded to the pleas for help from the Brest victims through the agency of the Brest Landsmanschaften. From all the corners of the world large sums of money were collected as well as clothing and goods. A philanthropic committee was set up in Brest supposedly to allocated the sums fairly to anyone that needed it.
However, this committee divided and distributed large amounts to the wealthy businessmen and merchants for the poor workers, tradesmen and small traders there was a barely opened hand of compassion, ignoring the beautiful appeals written in Yiddish from tradesmen and small traders asking for assistance to resurrect themselves. This revenue was supposed to support the tradesman rebuild his workshop, and assist the unemployed in their need.
But finally we need to stress the fact that despite all the persecutions, robberies, beatings, and murders, we Jews have emerged stronger and hardier than before, more ready to do battle for a free world, free of racial discrimination.
If Brest only possessed names such as Avraham Goldberg or Beinish Michalovitch that would be enough for the city's fame, but Brest also had a great tradition of rabbinical and Torah scholars going back to the time of the great sages, and it's great fame was mainly in the religious sphere. How then could Brest not be involved in worldly affairs?
Geographically Brest was not situated in favourable position for it's Jews: it's strategic position caused the fortress to be built there and for many years the Tsarist military authorities paid special attention to the city, also the Germans cast a watchful eye over the city. Brest was an important railway junction with lines to Warsaw, Moscow and Berlin. To possess this junction meant an important advantage in wartime.
Certainly the Jews had their livelihoods, mostly from various import/export agencies, small traders and merchants, but with the first winds of war their way of life and their very lives were destroyed. This is in effect what happened and had a huge effect on the lives of the inhabitants of Brest, both in W.W.1, the following Polish regime and in W.W.2.
However, even before W.W.1 a Jew could never feel totally secure or safe since Brest was inside the Russian Pale of Settlement. Due to this fact it was no wonder that a certain section of the Jewish youth could not remain in the city and searched for a place where they could use their dynamic abilities and creative talents.
An example of this was Avraham Goldberg, who wrote a very important chapter in the history of the Jewish press and journalism. Not all the Jews of Brest know that this son of their city was blessed by being a pioneer of Yiddish newspapers and opened a path for Jewish journalists, as he was amongst the first to be involved with Yiddish newspapers. By the way, his first steps along his path were with the Hebrew newspaper 'Hasphira', but his connection with this paper was short and in 1906 he began editing the Yiddish newspaper 'Morgenblatt' in Warsaw, followed by working for the 'Letzte Post'. One of the founders and editors of the newspaper 'Heint', Goldberg remained as an editor until his last days. A Zionist himself, he brought this spirit into the newspapers that he edited. He considered this to be an important spiritual and cultural aspect of his work and to be conducted it with his whole heart and with the highest moral approach. He was the first Brest proponent of a national Jewish journalism. The dates of his birth and death are symbolic - Avraham Goldberg was born in 1881, in that year the Jews of Russia were subjected to widespread pogroms and terrible anti-Semitic decrees, and he died in 1933, the same year that the Nazis came to power in Germany.
Avraham Goldberg was enlightened and became convinced that the solution to the predicament of the Jews was the establishment and rebirth of a Jewish national homeland. Just as there was much support in Brest towards a national homeland, there was also wide support for socialism and the workers movements.
On the tombstone of Beinish Michalovitch, or as he was lesser known by his real name of Joseph Izbicki, was the inscription: The Revolutionary Song of the Jewish Workers Movement. This indeed was his true description, as Beinish Michalovitch was really the song of the Jewish revolutionary movement. A song of the struggle and belief that he published uncompromisingly in the battles for the socialist cause. It is no wonder that the Jewish revolutionary movement loved him, and that his every word was ingrained in their hearts and consciousness.
Even his political opponents had respect and admired him, as he was enlightened and had an appealing bright personality, and a deep socialistic faith. An avowed Bundist, both inside and out, he was deeply steeped with a penetrating humanity. Nature had not bestowed upon him physical strength, but by the age of eighteen he was already a totally convinced socialist and his conviction came from universal ideas. He was a complete Jew, and loved the Jewish nation through the Jewish masses and the Jewish workers movements. He lived through their joys and heartaches, not only when he was free and could conduct his righteous battle for the rights of the Jewish workers, but also when he had been exiled and sent to Siberia.
Beinish Michalovitch was not just a campaigner and revolutionary because he put all his thoughts and ideas on paper he became in many ways the school and university of the Jewish workers. Using the strength of his popularity, he was the first to widely publicize the problems of the Jewish worker and to popularize socialism. In today's modern media, his social editorials seem naïve, but the working class can still learn a great deal about humane socialist ethics and similar topics. He possessed the power to explain his ideas simply, and when one reads his memoirs: The Memoirs of a Jewish Socialist today, one can still find ample material, not just for socialist sentiments and thoughts.
Thus his name will forever remain in the history of the Jewish workers movement, and in Jewish history generally sharing in the honor of Brest that gave such fighters for Jewish nationalism and social renaissance.
Brest was involved in all aspects of Jewish cultural and social events, and when one mentions the lives of Avraham Goldberg and Beinish Michalovitch, it would be a great omission not to mention a third name that was connected to these two, and that was Menachem Berisha. Menachem Berisha was the great and illustrious Yiddish writer who was the Brest connection to modern Yiddish literature. Although known to the literary world as 'Menachem' in reality his surname was Goldberg, and he was a brother of the above-mentioned Avraham Goldberg. He assumed the literary name of Berisha that was his mother's family name. Menachem began his career young and had his literary ordination with no less than Y.L. Peretz himself. One must acknowledge that he was one of the most 'individual' of the Yiddish writers not only with the contents of his poetry, but also with their style and form.
Menachem is a writer that stood astride two centuries born in Brest in 1888; already with his own eyes he experienced the revolution of 1905 and the resulting mass arrests of Jewish revolutionary youth in Brest. His restless spirit drove him to leave his hometown and he arrived in Warsaw in late 1905. He arrived literally with his right foot in the door of the Jewish literary world. His first writings were printed in the Peretz journal Der Weg (The Path) it was a great achievement in those times. He was also amongst the first Yiddish writers whose works were translated into Polish and Hebrew. His book Poland was translated into Polish and Hebrew in 1913. However the real flowering of his literary career came in 1915 when he left the Old World and came to New York. Then came his books: The Link In the Chain, Sand, and the huge interest evoked by his novel: Zavel Rimmer, partly because it was an autobiographical novel, but also because it was the first Yiddish novel to use psychological realism. Menachem possessed special powers and strengths in describing psychological situations, but after the publication of Zavel Rimmer there was a marked change in his creativity, and he began writing in a style of symbolism and mysticism. His work almost completely descended from his former realism into mysticism. In his works The Gilgul and The Shepherd David the characters are saturated with symbolism and a pure aestheticism. Menachem can be considered as an outright aesthete, which can be observed in The Shepherd David although the theme is that of a genuine historical character. Menachem's crowning effort is in his poem The Newcomer in which he brings together all the styles that he had formerly used hand in hand with the realism, one finds the symbolism and deep mysticism
One feels that he is awaking the spirit of the great Rabbi Luria of Brest the exclusive mystic and man of Kabala.
His work The Walker' elicited strong reactions, both positive and negative, but the most strident and unjustified of his critics were those who completely wanted to negate his work by the measure of a political majority, because it had a clear biographical character. The author searched for ways to be true to himself: which cannot be falsified and must be authentic.
Menachem was an outstanding author as well as a writer he was also a community activist. For a certain period he headed the Yiddish press of the Joint Organization, and then he worked with the American Jewish Congress, and edited the Congress Weekly in English. His literary articles set the tone for this publication style and Dr.Stephen ,the President of the American Jewish Congress at that time, held him in great esteem.
These three figures are links in the chain of Brest attributes to Jewish culture. However, it does not stop there although to tell the truth, the recent times have produced more than just literary figures, the modern writers also have more political flavour than literary content. The modern Brest writers include the novelist B.Shlevin, the storyteller Yitzchak Perlov, Betzalel Freidman, the two female authors Dora Teitelbaum and Anna Margolin, the journalist Pesach Novick, the revisionist Menachem Begin, and the newspaper columnist Y. Mikunis.
B. Shlevin belongs to the younger group of Brest writers he is primarily a fiction writer with a leaning to the great novelists. His first novel The March on Brest is an epic about the revolution and the Russian Civil War - in this novel the writer is faithful to the historical truth. He strives to be as accurate as possible as he writes of events that actually occurred. This novel has an absolute historical value, no less than his following novels: The Jews of Belville in which he characterizes Jewish life in Paris. This novel also contains some psychological insights, but not at the expense of realism. He only uses this to clarify the whole sociological character of the book.
By his work we can judge that Shlevin is of a leftist progressive ideology he was also a member of the French underground resistance against the Nazis, the theme of the contents of: It Happened Yesterday, his new novel was The Family Biekin, about Jewish family life in Paris. In this novel one feels that the author had arrived at a new style, entirely different from that of The Jews of Belville or The March On Brest. Shlevin belongs to the younger generation as he enters his maturity as a writer one can expect much more interesting and important works from him.
Y. Perlov also belongs to this younger generation he now resides in Israel and recently published a novel: The Returnee, which describes the situation of Polish Jews. A book of stories about life in Israel, called ' In Ones Own Land, also was published in Buenos Aires by Yiddish Books. It is difficult to judge Perlov's style by these two books, but he undoubtedly possesses great talent, knows the technique of writing and has the skill to develop dramatic scenarios. From his writings it is difficult to judge his political leanings, but from his stories one feels his great love for Israel and it's people that had arrived there to start a new life and participate in the Jewish renaissance there.
Regarding B. Freidman, his literary career had already begun in Poland his poems were published in the Weisenberg collection. In 1920 he left Poland for Israel and worked there in agriculture and road building. In 1922 he came to the U.S. and became a teacher. His began publishing his poems in the Freiheit newspaper. He resigned from the 'Poale Zion' party in New York and joined the communist party. In 1929 he published a book of his poems called: Illuminated Paths as well as two books for school children.
Illuminated Paths mainly contains poems with realistic themes, by the way, one can also find in this collection eighteen poems by men and women that have no relevance to the subject of Illuminated Paths, but are general poems interpreting the first and second great revolutionary events.
Freidman usually writes for children, his greatest work is: The Path of Nottaleh the Tailor.
The two female writers are especially interesting. Anna Margolin and Dora Teitelbaum both unique and utterly interesting from the literary sense. Anna Margolin is the literary name of Rosa Levensbaum she received a high school education and studied Hebrew under the pseudonym of Hannah Gross. Her stories received much attention, the majority of her poems appeared in the book: Flickering 0Eyes, and Poems. The tone of her poems is dreamy one reads them with the impression that they are prayers in a strange way it ties Anna to both religion and heresy. Generally her poems express the fate of mankind. It is also interesting that she is the only Brest writer ever to have written a poem titled Brisk, that illuminated and enhanced that name.
The writings of Dora Teitelbaum have an entirely different character. Arriving in New York in 1933, her literary career began with the publication of her first poems in Morgen Freiheit (morning freedom) in 1941. Dora's poems convey a revolutionary character they are saturated with her working class influences, and her poems convey her belief in absolute political confrontation. She herself says that she lights up a new direction in the still blue horizon and that she is ready for a holy class war against those that want to stop the revolutionary impetus.
Dora is a very prolific writer and generally a creative and dynamic literary force. She says of herself that she is carried forward by a locomotive and not by her feet. However, she is not lacking in femininity in her famous poem For Men. From you to me my poem, from me to you my song, and the pressure of your body, I'll never tire of being your wife. Dora's literary output is very productive until now there have already been several volumes of her poetry published, as well as a book of travelling impressions'. She is presently at the height of her literary creativity. Thus we can expect many more contributions from her and interesting poetry.
On the subject of modern Yiddish journalism, Pesach Novick has distinguished himself. Born in Brest 1891, he received a traditional Jewish upbringing and went to work in a factory aged 16. He joined the Bund organization after arriving in the U.S. from Switzerland in 1913. He immediately became the assistant secretary of the Jewish Socialist Federation. He began his literary career by editing the Federation's newspaper: Neie Welt.
In 1917 Novick returned to Russia, but did not stay long. In 1919 he went to Vilna and was the editor of the Bundist newspaper there. In 1920 he became one of the editors of the Vilna Yiddishen Tog, published by Zalman Reizen. In that same year, he returned to New York and went to work for the Vorverts newspaper - in this paper he began a debate about socialism, and in the second split, he left the party and joined the U.S. Workers Party (communist). He later resigned from the communist party, but rejoined in 1936. He helped establish the newspaper Freiheit, and also edited the newspaper of the needleworkers (textile) union and Einikeit (unity). He visited the Soviet Union in 1929 and 1932. At that time he wrote the Swearing In in Mineola. He wrote The 16th Zionist conference and the emerging status of Palestine, The Situation of Jews in The Soviet Union, American Blessings, The Whirlwind in Poland, and other pamphlets of political character.
Immediately after W.W.2, Novick made a trip through Europe and published his impressions in Europe Between War and Peace. He has been the editor of Morgen Freiheit for many years until the present day.
Besides the above-mentioned names, and to complete the picture, one should not omit M. Begin, Y. Mikunis who came to communism crossing out the road to Zionism, was more of a political activist than a writer, exactly just as Begin was more of a practical doer for the revisionist movement, and Chaim Finkelstein of Brest. One can rightly say that in Finkelstein, a piece of the history of Brest was evoked the self improvement of an A. Goldberg the fighter for a Jewish national (Zionist) renaissance, and the self improvement of a Beinish Michalovitch who wrote the most beautiful chapter in the history of Jewish socialism. One cannot say how much Chaim Finkelstein learned from his Brest predecessors, but their spirit and the battle for the national Jewish homeland was instilled in him, on the foundation of humanitarian socialism with all its social and ethical aspects.
In this manner Brest wrote an important and significant chapter in the history of the Jewish socialist and revolutionary movement, as well as in Jewish history and culture.
If the barbaric and wild enemy has erased the physical existence of the Jewish Brest with it's working masses and it's orthodox Jews, the spiritual Brest will remain forever more through its writers and cultural figures. These figures are a link in the golden chain of Jewish history, beginning with Shlomo Luria, Shaul and Meier Wahl, Michael Yesopovitch, and Mendel Frank and the famous Brest yeshiva that stood until our modern times, through to all the Brest fighters in deeds and words for a better world and a free Jewish nation. stronger and hardier than before, more ready to do battle for a free world, free of racial discrimination.
I recall the printing trade in Brest from 1909, the year I began as an apprentice typesetter. My first position was at the printing and bookbinding business of the old Gendler and Sons. The sons were Moshe, Itzik, and Shmulik, who ran the business although they themselves were not trained printers. The oldest typesetter in this business was Noach Kleiner, and the elderly Stavski worked there as well. I began there together with a few other apprentices Shevach Buchbinder was one of them, he was the son of Gershon the bookbinder who also worked at Gendler's. The elderly Gelman had begun as an apprentice there and he controlled the printing press. The press operator was called Aryeh there was no electricity then, in order to operate the press one needed a wheel turner to manually turn the wheel all day. This was a terrible job, but they found two old bachelor brothers, Israel Leizor and Feivish who would turn the wheel all day long with great 'expertise'.
The second printing press that I worked for belonged to Ginsberg (Gendler's son in law). There I worked together with Yudel Pack and the Barenboim brothers, and later the printer David Katz. Orchov's printing press was mostly occupied with printing political (propaganda) material. The two largest printing presses were Rakov's on Shossenaya St., and the second one was on the Nevski Prospect. Both were involved in larger scale works Rakov's printed the daily newspaper Nashe Slovo(Our Word). Also the Kobrynetz Printing Company printed a newspaper called Nashe Kray (Our Country), whose editor was named Stern he was a very nice man and I worked there as a typesetter until the front line of W.W.1 neared the city and all the inhabitants of Brest were exiled from the city.
After W.W.1, I returned to my hometown of Brest and the printing presses were re-established. The following printing businesses opened: Ginsberg, Gendler's Sons, Tenenbaum, and Kleinman. The latter two were newcomers to Brest. This was the situation in Brest in 1920 when I left for Argentina.
Thanks to the construction of the main Brest railway station, which was renowned as one of the largest and most beautiful in Russia, and the position of the Brest Fortress that housed several hundred military families people from all the towns and villages in the Brest district would come into Brest with full wagons and carts to sell their produce. They would then buy their supplies and merchandise from the Jewish merchants. These were some of the factors that made Brest an important and large centre of trade, with many Jewish merchants of the first and second guild, who had the right to travel throughout Russia.
Therefore there were many wealthy businessmen and merchants who lived in extravagant luxury with their families, whilst many more Brest families hungered and struggled to survive.
Jews wholly owned all the large import and export businesses. It was therefore natural that the various branches of these trading enterprises employed large amounts of the working masses that were exploited in the worst sense.
Already then the workers fought for improvement in their working conditions. But these masses of untrained proletariat were very difficult to organize. When called on to protest they were very reluctant to cooperate, as the majority were middle-aged family men who would accompany their employers and pray with them at the same synagogue. How then, could they unite against their fellow 'orthodox' Jews?
Firstly, they were also afraid of dismissal. Secondly, they were afraid to break the law and would only belong to a legal organization such as the Soyuz Prokashov, the government sanctioned union of employees. Thereby they could show their loyalty to their employer and to the Tsar.
But the revolutionaries and the professional unions of workers made giant steps of progress at that time and attracted to their ranks embittered and disillusioned workers that worked in slave labor conditions. They began to form professional workers organizations based on the example of the workers unions, of which the author of this article was one of the founders.
After this the union successfully carried out several strikes that included the following:
A strike at Grosleits Hat Factory and store there were seven employees, the two younger worker/ apprentices resigned in protest, but the older five did not want to. The union used all its power to try to 'persuade' them but nothing helped. On a certain evening several union members visited three of the strike breakers with the splendid result that Grosleit stood with his key at the factory the next morning and waited as usual for his employees to arrive but nobody came. After a while he was forced to open the store himself, and in a great rage this prominent Jew and gabbeh (deacon) of his synagogue hired five gentiles workers in place of the strikers. After the union explained the situation, the Christian workers decided not to turn up for work. After a few days, Grosleit conceded to their demands.
Representatives of the Polish Socialist Party would often come to Brest. One of them was a pleasant and very good speaker named Arl. He presence in Brest was always a great lift to the morale of the workers and employees. To make the most of his oratory skills we decided to hold a mass meeting with the participation of the older employees.
In those days the reactionary authorities were very active and there was much repression against everyone that came to Brest - the governor Orgeniev did a great deal of evil to the worker's movement. He subsequently paid for his crimes with his life. His executioner was a Brisker now living in North America.
It was impossible to rent a hall for this meeting so we decided to take over the Chassidic prayer house at Domachevo, (40 kilometres from Brest). After the close of business in Brest the employees began to go to Domachevo for the meeting. It did not take long and the prayer house was fully packed. In the middle of comrade Arl's speech the shammes (beadle) of the prayer house began to shout in spite of the threats of those comrades that stood around him. There was a terrible rush as people fled through the doors and windows. The police arrived to find everyone had gone, but the shammes gave them all the details of the meeting.
We discovered that a meeting was to be called on a certain day by the employers and business owners at Bikur Cholim offices to discuss a general lock out of their employees because they could not tolerate any more of their chutzpah. On the same evening at Berl Serlin's (the employee of a timber mill) house, we were convinced that this meeting had to be disrupted. To this end, it was decided that comrade Yossel Shafir, the female comrade Chaytche, and the author of this article were to take on this mission. Our aim was to fire a few shots from two revolvers into the air and immediately hand them to Chaytche so that they would not be found on us if we were detained. The next morning in the Russian newspaper - if I'm not mistaken it was called Bresti Listok there was a report of a shooting at the employers meeting, and that Bromberg who owned a galoshes business, fell to the ground in fright and screamed Shma Israel.
O where are you now, you dear comrades, every one of you fought heroically and bravely for a better and more beautiful morning, unafraid of the tsarist prisons and Siberia.
By Hershel Pachinski
When we remember our hometown of Brest, we must not forget the role that the Brest pioneer organization played in the development of the youth of Brest. In addition to preparing the Zionist youth with training in agriculture and trades, there was much education in the social and cultural spheres, especially local politics. This began after W.W.1 when life in the burnt out city began to normalize. A group of the city Zionist elders decided to establish a youth movement of Brest Pioneer Youth with the aim of training them for emigration to Israel.
However, with the development of this organization, the pioneer youth movement faced great problems that it could not overcome, and these factors caused the organization to be the way it was until the outbreak of W.W.2. - It was the most important Zionist pioneer organization in the entire Polessie district and in all of the Kressy (the former Russian territory of eastern Poland 1921-1939). It was a working class organization that took a stand on all national and international issues. The Brest pioneer movement spread through all the sections and levels of the professional movements. The representatives of the Brest Zionist pioneers could be found at 5 Kosciusko St., where they battled together with the other socialist progressive forces for the betterment of the Brest working masses.
There were also language problems that plagued the Brest pioneer movement, such as the struggle for education in the Hebrew language.
Thanks to the healthy attitudes and strong beliefs of the Brest pioneer founders that were on the correct path there are hundreds of former Brest pioneers now in Israel, class-conscious workers who have contributed to their professions and risen through the ranks for the benefit of all workers in Israel and the whole world.
Former Brest pioneers who benefited from the training and education they received from the Brest pioneer movement have also immigrated to other countries like Argentina where they are involved in and conduct important social and communal work.
It is with great pain that everything that was in our birthplace was torn apart and destroyed in W.W.2 therefore making it essential that we should continue on our path of building a healthy Jewish life.
On a Saturday evening in the middle of the month of May, before the war of 1914, we returned tired and exhausted from a meeting in the city gardens of the Brest Jewish Voluntary Fire-fighters.
I accepted my companion's invitation to come to his home as it was the nearest to my own home. Steps away from the city gardens, we were already at the punt - my friend lived in the well-known 'Punt shteibl' that stood between the old and new Mukhavets River. My friend, Yitzhak Morde, was one of the many sons of Hersh Wolf Margolis who held many types of leasehold. For years he was the arendar (leaseholder) of the punt that spanned the River Mukhavets and linked the small towns and villages on the other side to Brest. Hersh Wolf felt and acted as if he was the captain of the gang of the riverbank workers, who would haul the timber logs that came down the river to Brest - out of the water and taken to the timber mills to be cut into planks. He would stand on a moving log and give orders on how to untie the logs so that his workers could take them out of the water individually.
The leaseholder Hersh Wolf was not alone he had seven sturdy sons:
Yossel, Isser, Noach, Yankel, Yitzhak, Peretz and Leibl. It is difficult to enumerate their assets they easily overtook their capable father. The whole city resonated with tales about them as they dominated the river, they saved people from drowning, and would carry people safely across in a storm, or row them in a fishing boat when the waves were too rough and the punt could not be used. Hersh Wolf's sons were all excellent swimmers.
Hersh Wolf lived in the isolated shteibl (hut) that stood on the riverbank with his family. Two of his sons, Yankel and Noach were professional boat builders they were expert craftsmen and conducted this business. They built and repaired boats they specialized in building comfortable pleasure crafts that were often seen floating on the river, painted in bright colours. In the summer evenings when the youth of Brest would promenade along the riverbank, these two would also be the lifeguards. Devoted to their work, they erected a little watchtower and would keep guard at night, their eyes and ears alerted like a hunter straining to hear any call for help. People would use the punt to cross over the river 24 hours a day, it was only one kilometre across from Brest to Kotelne, with many paths and tracks, none of them were really safe and there were always risks at night.
Among the workers that Hersh Wolf employed were two - Koszick and Kolas. These two were known by all especially the young who would come to the river to amuse themselves on the Sabbath and holydays. On those days the Margolis family would rest from their supervision of the punt and the boat hire, and entrust their business to the two men, who were not just their employees, but also their friends. The two 'Goyim', who spoke Yiddish, would assume all the responsibilities including that of saving lives. Koszick and Kolas later perished at the hands of the bestial Germans together with the Margolis family, because of their connections to the Jews.
The Margolis family also had the franchise of providing Brest with ice. They would fill the hospital cellars so that there would be enough ice for the patients until the next winter. The same was for the meat and milk cellars. They conducted this winter business with the greatest of energy from frosty morning until nightfall the whole family would work digging the large blocks of ice from the frozen river.
The people of Brest held the leaseholder of the punt in the greatest respect everyone knew the 'Captain' of the river and his seven strong sons.
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the translation. The reader may wish to refer to the original material
for verification.
JewishGen is not responsible for inaccuracies or omissions in the original work and cannot rewrite or edit the text to correct inaccuracies and/or omissions.
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Updated 28 Nov 2006 by LA


text:
I'm in YouTube HTML5 trial, and the experience is terrible with Safari.
Every video is lagging severely, and the browser gets unresponsive constantly.
I have zero problems with the Flash version, and Chrome handles HTML5 YouTube just fine.
Activity Monitor says QTKitServer - Safari Web Content grabs more than 100% CPU.
Can I fix this?
I have 17-inch Mid 2010 MacBook Pro running Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2 with 8 GB of RAM.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
OpenText GDPR Commitment
A message from our DPO
At OpenText™, we are committed to our customers' success and protecting their information. We recognize that this commitment isn't just about the products and services we offer, but how we operate as an organization with respect to our own compliance.
OpenText welcomed the GDPR as an opportunity to review our information governance program, and ensure our internal processes, procedures, data systems and documentation were ready when GDPR came into force.
We have been helping our customers manage and protect their enterprise information assets since 1991. We are using the same technologies to support our own journey to GDPR readiness, with our own internal experts leading the way.
We would like to share the steps we've taken as well as initiatives in the works in our GDPR Program. These steps ensure success for both OpenText and our customers on this GDPR journey.
Pieter J.L. (Berry) Wittenberg
OpenText Global Data Protection Officer
The General Data Protection Regulation
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the new European Union data privacy legislation to modernize and reform the laws that address the handling of personal data of European Union residents. It represents the biggest overhaul of the world's privacy rules in more than 20 years.
Our commitment to the GDPR
As the leader in Enterprise Information Management, OpenText takes information security and privacy very seriously. We have long maintained industry best practices to incorporate data protection and privacy in our day-to-day practices, as well as helping our customers implement our solutions and expertise to build strong compliance programs of their own.
OpenText has thoroughly analyzed GDPR requirements and their relevance to us as both a data controller and data processor. In response, OpenText has implemented an organization-wide GDPR compliance strategy intended to meet all requirements in the regulation, involving a cross-functional team of internal resources. We are proud to say our business already incorporated many of these requirements and principles prior to GDPR coming into effect. Like many organizations, we are using the GDPR as an opportunity to further strengthen our practices.
Summary of our approach
- Executive Leadership Team endorsed development of GDPR Program
- Appointment of Global Data Protection Officer
- Conducted enterprise GDPR diagnostic assessment led by global risk advisory firm EY LLP
- Established a cross-functional GDPR task force and assigned responsibilities
- Prepared implementation plan to deliver on Assessment recommendations
- Conducted data discovery of personal information across the enterprise
- Inventoried and documented records of processing activities
- Implemented action plans by each affected line of business including Marketing, HR, Procurement and IT
- Maintaining the registry of processing activities
- Conducting privacy impact assessments on a regular cadence
- Updating risk framework on a regular basis
- Confirming operating effectiveness of risk controls
OpenText as a Data Controller
As a company that collects and processes the personal data of our customers, partners and employees, we have implemented key GDPR preparedness initiatives including:
- Consent management – Consent standards have increased under the GDPR. However, OpenText has already been compliant with similar existing requirements inside data privacy regulations from other jurisdictions, including countries within Europe. Our Sales and Marketing organizations conducted a thorough review of their consent management practices and have brought them in line with the GDPR. This includes active opt-in to continue to receive communications from us as well as including privacy purpose statements when we collect personal info e.g. to share research papers.
As an existing or prospective customer, you have may have seen some of those changes in your interactions with our web pages, events invitations and emails. Pre-checked or implied opt-ins are insufficient—individuals must know to what they are consenting and that they may withdraw consent at any time. At OpenText, we strive to create personalized and delightful experiences for those who engage with us and maximize the value for customers at each interaction, at the same time balancing this objective with security, trust and respect. - Human Resources – The GDPR is not just about our customers. Although there are GDPR efforts focused on external data, the new regulation also extends to the personal data we hold regarding our job applicants and employees. Our Human Resources team has implemented and continues to work on several initiatives to comply with the GDPR including:
- Optimizing our HR systems to manage applicant and employee information in accordance with the GDPR.
- Reviewing HR systems to better manage the information we hold, why we hold it, who has access to it and for how long we hold it.
- Developing Consent and Privacy Notices to provide transparency to our candidates and employees of the information we hold, why we hold it, who has access to it and for how long we hold it.
- Reviewing HR related policies and procedures to ensure data privacy compliance with the new legislation.
- Records management – We are working to ensure our records management policy includes retention schedules that authorize disposition when customer information is inactive, outdated or no longer needed. This will support the data minimization principle and assist us to avoid retaining the personal data of our customers for a longer period than necessary.
- Security – Data privacy and data security are two equally important parts of a comprehensive data protection strategy. While OpenText already follows information security and risk management industry best practices as defined by our ISO 27001:2013 global Information Security Management System (ISMS), we are aware of the new and increased security standards that GDPR introduces and will continue to evaluate and update our practices to ensure that they align with industry standards. Our ISMS provides continuous and rigorous risk management processes to help support the ongoing confidentiality, integrity, and availability of all information in the custody of OpenText.
- Policies, procedures and training – We reviewed relevant policies and procedures and updated them to reflect any new privacy requirements, including those relating to Security, IT, Privacy and HR. These reviews are ongoing. You can read our OpenText Privacy and Security Policy and Cookie Policy on our website. OpenText has a long-standing practice of mandatory Corporate Information Security and Compliance and Ethics training for all staff. Curricula has been reviewed to incorporate new content necessary to raise awareness and educate employees about their obligations under the GDPR.
OpenText as a Data Processor
It is important that we fulfill our commitments under the GDPR as a data processor to our customers, the data controllers, who are using a third-party like us to process personal data. Some of our key activities in this area are:
- Rights of data subjects – GDPR gives individuals the right to access the data provided to and processed by the controller for purposes including deletion, rectification, transfer to another controller and objection to processing. The data we house on behalf of customers is owned by the customer, who is the data controller. Our customers also maintain the access control to their data, which means in the majority of cases, as data controller they can respond to and action requests from their data subjects. As a data processor, we do not respond directly to requests from data subjects. We continue to further enhance our processes and applications to better enable customers to respond to lawful requests from their data subjects.
- Contractual commitments – We work with our customers to ensure that the GDPR obligations are included in the contractual commitments for our cloud services to the customers satisfaction, including the use and management of sub-processors, timely security support and breach notifications in accordance with the new requirements. Cloud services agreements include statements regarding how data is to be handled while we are custodians of the data and how it can be repatriated to the customer upon termination of services. We also reviewed our data processing agreements (DPA) to standardize the inclusion of GDPR requirements. OpenText has worked extensively with EU counsel to help ensure our agreements contain appropriate provisions for lawful personal data processing.
- Cloud security – Enterprises trust OpenText to manage their business-critical applications and information, in large part due to our commitment and expertise in cloud security, privacy and compliance. All our cloud services have a baseline standard of privacy and security, with technical and organizational security controls governed by industry standard third parties and proven via independent attestations.
OpenText has certified all levels (data center, infrastructure, platform-application and service certifications may vary) to assure our customers of the security controls, processes, procedures and policies that we have in place. Further certifications will be gained over time either to extend coverage or to add certifications as required by the industry and our customers.
Our EIM products and services are certified with many industry and regional standards eg. HIPAA, FDA 21 CFR Part 11, FINRA. We will continue to evolve our controls as industry standards change. Some of the current cloud certifications are as follows:
Enterprise Cloud
- SOC 1 Type II
- SOC 2 Type II
Business Network
- SOC 1 Type II
- SOC 2 Type II
Business Network – EasyLink
- SOC 1 Type II
- SOC 2 Type II
Documentum (DaaS) Cloud
- SOC 2 Type I
- SOC 2 Type II
- Breach notification – Operationalizing incident management and meeting the 72-hour breach reporting window is, and will continue to be, a challenge for all organizations. The OpenText Global Information Security Team has a well-established Data Breach Response Process that spans from the time a suspected breach has occurred to post-incident response closure steps. OpenText data breach procedures are comprised of five steps: discovery, assessment, response, protection and recovery. It is in the "response" step where breach reporting requirements and timeframes are determined. OpenText has reviewed data breach notification laws in all regions in which we operate, including the requirements under the GDPR, and is committed to compliance.
Helping our customers along the GDPR journey
Enterprise Information Management (EIM) technologies are key to an effective and sound privacy compliance and data protection strategy. As the leader in EIM, OpenText is committed to helping our customers along their journey to GDPR readiness and compliance. However, it is important to recognize that compliance is a shared responsibility. Regulatory compliance requires a combination of processes, policies, expertise, education and training as well as the right technology tools. We believe that the path to compliance requires a shared understanding and common culture around privacy.
How we help our customers prepare for the GDPR:
- GDPR resources – We have posted whitepapers, videos, webinars-on-demand and blog posts explaining how organizations can comply with key GDPR principles using EIM and our services.
- OpenText Product Security Assurance Program (PSAP) – Long before the GDPR, OpenText has established our Product Security Assurance Program. The PSAP is intended to ensure that our products, solutions and services are designed, developed and maintained with security in mind.
- Data protection by design and by default – Under the terms of the GDPR, privacy should be built in deliberately and be adopted by default in processing systems. At OpenText, we are constantly reviewing privacy by design principles, such as end-to-end security, to incorporate them into not only our business processes and systems but into the software we develop.


text:
Next: Floating-Point Computation Up: Lent Term 2009: Part Previous: Databases Contents
Digital Communication I
Lecturer: Dr A.W. Moore
No. of lectures: 12
This course is a prerequisite for the Part II courses Digital Communication II, Distributed Systems and Security.
The aims of this course are to develop an understanding of communications networks from a wide perspective, within a framework of principles rather than technologies or architectures. Technologies and architectures will, however, be used as examples and motivation.
- Scope.
Two example systems: Ethernet and the telephone system: basic
operation; common issues; differing constraints; differing approaches.
- Partitioning the problem.
Abstraction, service versus implementation; layering as a
restricted form of abstraction; motivation for layering; the channel
as an abstraction; layered channels.
- Fundamental transmission.
Emphasis on the service provided by physical channel; limitations:
noise, attenuation. Channel capacity (bandwidth). Modulation
techniques for digital systems.
- Coding.
Coding as a general concept: modulation as a form of coding,
A/D, D/A, error correcting and detecting codes, other forms of coding,
relation to layering.
- Multiplexing.
Basic definitions, FDM, synchronous and asynchronous TDM. Circuit
switching, packet switching, ATM. Shared media networks with particular
emphasis on media access control. Packet scheduling. Non orthogonal
multiplexing. Multiplexing and channel characteristics.
- Switching and routing.
Introduction from LAN perspective (repeaters, bridges, routers).
Fundamental view of switching extended to telephone network,
connectionless versus connection oriented.
- Protocols and state.
Imperfect view of state at far end of channel. ARQ as an example
of an error control protocol; sliding window ARQ as an example of a
flow control protocol; flow control in general: X.25 as an example.
- Naming, addressing and routing.
Service access points, binding. Hierarchical versus flat address
spaces. Routing classifications and algorithms.
- The Internet.
Internet architecture, context of development, addressing and routing,
transmission control protocol (TCP), higher layer protocols, evolution.
- Standards.
Role of standards, dynamics of standards process, standards
At the end of the course students should
- be able to analyse a communication system by separating out the
different functions provided by the network
- understand that there are fundamental limits to physical transmission
- understand the general principles behind multiplexing, addressing,
routing and stateful protocols as well as specific examples of each
- understand what FEC is and how CRCs work
- be able to compare communications systems in how they solve
similar problems
- have an informed view of the internal workings of the Internet
Recommended reading
* Peterson, L.L. & Davie, B.S. (2007). Computer networks: a systems approach. Morgan Kaufmann (4th ed.).
Comer, D. & Stevens, D. (2005). Internetworking with TCP-IP, vol. 1 and 2. Prentice Hall (5th ed.).
Schwartz, M. (1987). Telecommunication networks: protocols, modeling and analysis. Addison-Wesley.
Next: Floating-Point Computation Up: Lent Term 2009: Part Previous: Databases Contents


text:
Bob Feller
There's so much good material online on the life of Bob Feller, I'll just start you off by linking to Joe Posnanski's remembrance. Then there's David Wade at the Hardball Times, Tim Kurkjian at ESPN.com, mulitple pieces by Rob Neyer at ESPN.com and Keith Thursby at the Times. Don't skimp on your reading ...
* * *
Further to Wednesday's points about the dangers of offering relievers multiyear contracts comes this piece from Dave Cameron at Fangraphs.
Daniel Burke, co-owner of the Dodgers' Double-A affiliate in Chattanooga, is ailing — an emotional situation for the family, and tangentially, one that could affect the Dodgers' future with the team. David Paschall of the Chattanooga Times Free Press has the story (brought to my attention by a Dodger Thoughts commenter).
Sons of Steve Garvey points us to this New York Times article about gadgets and such that might be coming to baseball, including this little slice of heaven:
At one booth, Brian Traudt explained his company's innovation, which could improve the fan experience at stadiums, unless some people actually enjoy waiting in line for three innings for a cheeseburger. The product, Bypass Lane, is a kind of E-ZPass for concession stands that is administered through an application on a smartphone.
The user enters the stadium and confirms its location via GPS. Once the section, row and seat number are included, the application identifies all the concession stands and provides menus. The fan orders — and pays — from the phone. When the order is ready, the fan receives a text message to pick it up at a lane dedicated to Bypass Lane orders. The fan can skip the longer lines — though perhaps not the jealous glances of other fans.
I hope you caught Wednesday's MLB Network rebroadcast of Game 7 of the 1960 World Series. I was able to see the final six innings, and that was just a heap of fun.


text:
"You are so brave!"
So often that is the response when we talk of some destination or our plans for reaching and discovering it. (That's us high above Dubrovnik, Croatia in the photo above.)
No, not brave.
Just passionate about seeing the world while we are 'young' enough to do so.
Along the way we've met others who haven't let age or health deter pursuit of their passions. As the year draws to a close, we've been remembering some of those folks who've inspired us along the way:
The two ladies in the photo above finally paused long enough for me to snap a photo of them while on a stop in Ravenna, Italy. They were fellow cruisers who had been a continual source of inspiration from the moment we first noticed them aboard the ship.
Their white-hair and frail-frames masked the spirits of a couple of independent travelers who were constantly on the go; never missing a port of call – nor an afternoon of reading at poolside when on the ship.
Two years ago, on the Greek island of Poros we visited one afternoon with self-taught artist Vasilas Poriotis as he sat in his sidewalk gallery.
As our visit ended we told him that we hoped to return one day and find him there. He said he would be "if I am not dead." Then with a sweeping gesture over his work, he added, "I am not focused on the end - I am not afraid of it when it comes. . .it is what you leave behind that matters. And I have left something behind. . .It is important to leave something behind."
John Koruga, who splits his time between Seattle and Mexico, has pursued his travel passions for decades. But it wasn't until this fall, at age 86, he tried the world of cruising. He flew from Seattle to Rome and boarded the Celebrity Silhouette, the cruise on which we also 'looped Italy's boot'.
Age and health are not topics John readily discusses (although he had both knees replaced a few years ago); he'd prefer to talk about the next trip he'd like to make and he's got quite a few on his list. In this photo he was teaching me the art of bocce ball.
"Pero, por que piedra? (But, why stone?), Joel asked of the 76-year-old artist as he explained how he goes to the river and searches for rocks, loads them into a wheelbarrow and hauls them.
"Porque es mi pasion, (Because it is my passion)," he answered simply with a shrug and a grin.
"The colors of the sea" is what I told him when he said he wanted to make me a gift. But the real gift was the time I spent with Georgios Chalkoutsakis on that warm spring afternoon on Crete's southern shore. Georgios is a glass bead artist whom some might label as 'handicapped', but I would call him talented!
He is wheelchair bound as a result of a premature birth. His hand movement is a bit limited but that hasn't kept him from perfecting his art of glass bead making. My colors of the sea are pictured on the left.
Yes, we believe it all comes down to daring to pursue a passion. Will 2013 be the year that you begin pursuing a long-put-off passion? Or will you simply step up the pursuit of an existing one?
Stop by Budget Travelers Sandbox today if you need a bit more travel inspiration. And if you want to receive TravelnWrite posts in your inbox, sign up in the box on the corner,become a friend by signing up below that box (where our other friend's photos appear) or follow us on Facebook. We'll get back to the Winter Western Road Trip this weekend.


text:
Last modified: 2004-08-14 by dov gutterman
Keywords: kyiv | kiev | cartouche | crown | archangel michael | lily | minsk | aureola | sword | cross | obolon |
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Other sites:
During soviet time, Kyiv had 14 administrative districts
(rayons) with such names as: Leninskyi rayon, Minskyi rayon,
Moskovskyi rayon etc. Few years ago a new law about the Capital
of Ukraine was adopted and Kyiv received 10 new rayons, new
borders, new names. The Obolonskyi rayon include generally
territories of the old Minskyi rayon. So, rayon council
re-adopted Coat of Arms and flag (but the new flag is blue,
former Minskyi rayon was white-blue).
Andriy Grechylo, 28 July 2004
from the site of Ukrainian
From the site of Ukrainian
"The arms was approved by district council at February, 29,
2000. In an azure field with argent compartment is an argent
archangel Michael above the or arch bridge. He has an or aureola,
sword and cross. The compartment contains the three argen lilies,
directioned hill up, and two azure liles, directioned from top to
bottom. The emblem adorned by or decorative cartouche and crowned
by argent mauerkrown with three towers. There is azure ribbon
with or superscription "Mins'kyi raion of Kyiv" in the
cartouche bottom."
Dov Gutterman, 20 November 2000
from the site of Ukrainian
From the site of Ukrainian
"The gonfalone was approved by district council at February,
29, 2000. and a rectangular canvas with a ratio of the sides: 1:1
derivated by two isometric horizontal bands of white and cyan
colours. In the center of the panel is the Coat of Arms of region
in the cartouche and with the crown."
Dov Gutterman, 20 November 2000


text:
Dear Bacon,
Perhaps you haven't gotten our repeated entreaties asking for you to leave us alone and go away quietly, but you've gone way too far this time. This whole bacon-flavored vodka thing has really pushed us over the edge.
It must be said, your latest maneuver is about as far away from Don Lee's bacon-infused Old Fashioned (which he concocted while at PDT, though he now mans the bar battle station at Ssam) as you can get. We can just see the boys in the distilled spirits lab at Black Rock Spirits going to work on this months ago, as the entire world lost its collective little mind over the Bacon Explosion—and the vodka coming to market right when people are wondering they can get Swine Flu from drinking it.
P.S. OK, we must admit, we're mildly intrigued at the concept of putting this in a Bloody Mary garnished with a thick slab of bacon.


text: In the Lexus Eco Challenge, student teams tackle environmental issues related to land, water, air, and climate, and create practical solutions while competing for prizes. The contest is broken into three main parts. The Land & Water Challenge is first, followed by an Air & Climate Challenge. The Jericho team competed in the Land and Water Challenge and finished first in the regionals, winning $10,000. The team then moved on to the next round finishing first place nationally earning $15,000. Congratulations to Jericho juniors Brandon Xie, Brian Sang, Rohan Basavaraju, Mansi Vohra, Emma Gan, Benjamin Wong, and James Kim.


text:
Infielder Andy Parrino designated for assignment
Arlington, Texas — The Texas Rangers announced today that the club has placed right-handed pitcher Tanner Scheppers on the 15-day disabled list with right elbow inflammation. To take his place on the active roster, the club has purchased the contract of left-handed pitcher Aaron Poreda (#49) from Triple-A Round Rock. To make room for Poreda on the 40-man roster, the club has designated infielder Andy Parrino for assignment.
Scheppers has gone 0-1 with a 9.82 ERA (20 ER/18.1 IP) in 4 games/starts for the Rangers this season, his first major league starts. The club's Opening Day starter would be eligible to return from the disabled list on May 3.
Poreda, 27, will be in uniform for tonight's series opener with the White Sox. He has spent the season with Round Rock, posting no record with a 6.75 ERA (3 ER/4.0 IP) in 5 relief outings. Pacific Coast League opponents have gone 6-for-18 (.333) with one walk and 5 strikeouts. He allowed all 3 runs in his 2nd outing of the year on April 6 vs. Oklahoma City. His last outing was Tuesday at Omaha, when he retired his only batter faced and stranded an inherited runner (6 pitches/3 strikes).
Poreda spent the spring in big league camp with Texas, going 0-1 with a 3.24 ERA (3 ER/8.1 IP) over 8 relief outings in the Cactus League before he was assigned to minor league camp on March 25. He missed all of last season after 'Tommy John' ligament replacement surgery in October 2012 and is seeking his first big league outing since October 2, 2009 with the Padres vs. San Francisco. His only major league action came with the White Sox and Padres that year, going a combined 1-0 with a 2.70 ERA (4 ER/13.1 IP) in 14 relief appearances. Poreda was originally a first round selection (25th overall) by the White Soxin the 2007 June draft out of the University of San Francisco.
Parrino was received on a waiver claim from the Oakland Athletics on March 3, and was optioned to Round Rock in March 17. He has spent the season with the Express, batting .189 (10-53) with 3 doubles and 5 RBI in 13 games. The Rangers have 10 days to trade, release, or outright Parrino to the minor leagues.
With today's moves, the Rangers still have a full 40-man roster.


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Nintendo 64
- This article is about the console. For the N64 game system decoration from Generation II, see Game system.
ニンテンドウ64 Nintendo 64 | ||||||||||||||||
Nintendo 64 | ||||||||||||||||
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The Nintendo 64 (Japanese: ニンテンドウ64 Nintendo 64), often shortened to N64, is a cartridge-based console created by Nintendo. It is the successor to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, and was eventually succeeded by the Nintendo GameCube.
The Nintendo 64 is named for its 64-bit central processing unit. It was the last major home console to use cartridges as a primary storage format until the Nintendo Switch. It was first codenamed "Project Reality" and later referred to as the "Ultra 64" before the final name was chosen. It was originally set to release in mid-1995, but was delayed to 1996 for hardware problems in the chipset.
- Expansion Pak – a memory expansion that replaces the console's Jumper Pak found in the Memory Expansion port. It increases available memory from 4MB to 8MB and changes the internal resolution from 320×240 to 640×480 for games that can utilize it. The only Pokémon game that can utilize it fully is Pokémon Stadium 2.
- Transfer Pak – an accessory that plugged into the controller and allowed the Nintendo 64 to transfer data between Game Boy and N64 games. Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Stadium 2 are games that rely heavily on the Transfer Pak.
- Nintendo 64DD – a short lived expansion system for the Nintendo 64. Several Pokémon games that were announced for the N64DD were either canceled or released on cartridge format only.
- VRU (Voice Recognition Unit) – This device is packed in and required to play Hey You, Pikachu!.
- Rumble Pak – an optional plug in device that "shakes" the controller in enabled games. The only Pokémon related game that uses it is Super Smash Bros. The name was used again for the Nintendo DS accessory.
Pokémon games
There are seven Pokémon games for the Nintendo 64. In order of first release anywhere in the world, they are:
Title | Genre | Release |
Pokémon Stadium (Japanese) | Battle simulation | 1998 |
Hey You, Pikachu! | Virtual pet | 1998 |
Pokémon Snap | First-person rail shooter | 1999 |
Pokémon Stadium (English) | Battle simulation | 1999 |
Pokémon Puzzle League | Puzzle | 2000 |
Pokémon Stadium 2 | Battle simulation | 2000 |
With Transfer Pak and Game Boy Tower
In the Pokémon Stadium series, Game Boy and Game Boy Color main series Pokémon games can be played by the Game Boy Tower.
Title | Genre | Release |
Pokémon Red and Green | Main series RPG | 1996 |
Pokémon Blue | Main series RPG | 1996 |
Pokémon Red and Blue | Main series RPG | 1998 |
Pokémon Yellow | Main series RPG | 1998 |
Pokémon Gold and Silver | Main series RPG | 1999 |
Pokémon Crystal | Main series RPG | 2000 |
Pokémon special editions
- Pikachu Nintendo 64: A special Pikachu Nintendo 64 Set that came with a Pokémon controller. The Poké Ball is the On/Off switch and Pikachu's foot is the reset button. It came in two colors (blue and orange).
- In Japan, it was released on July 21, 2000.[2]
- It was released in the United States during the holiday season of 2000. The MSRP was $189.99 for the normal set.
- The Pikachu Nintendo 64 was also available in a bundle exclusive to Toys "R" Us. It came with a pocket watch and the Hey You, Pikachu! game, whereas all other retailers got the base unit with the controller.
- Pokémaniac Nintendo 64: A special Pokémon Edition of the Nintendo 64 was sold in Australia. Also included with the special Pokémon unit was the controller and the PAL released VHS of Pokémon - I Choose You!.
External links
- Nintendo (Japanese)
Game systems with Pokémon games |
Nintendo handheld consoles |
GB (Pocket · GBL · SGB · SGB2) • GBC • mini • GBA (SP · GBm · GBP) DS (Lite · DSi · DSi XL) • 3DS (XL · 2DS · New 3DS · New 3DS XL · New 2DS XL) Switch (Lite · OLED) |
Nintendo home consoles |
SNES (BS-X · SGB · NP · SGB2) • N64 (DD) • GCN (GBP) Wii (Family Edition · mini) • Wii U Switch (OLED) |
Pico • CoCoPad • Beena |


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Dave Johnson, Speak Out California
Michael Hiltzik in the LA Times today,
To everyone who claims that our wealthiest citizens pay more than their fair share of income taxes and we should cut them a break because they're the ones who, you know, create jobs in our economy, I have four words for you:
Frank and Jamie McCourt.
The McCourts, who own the Los Angeles Dodgers (so she says; he says he's the owner and she's not), jointly pocketed income totaling $108 million from 2004 through 2009, according to documents Jamie McCourt recently filed in the couple's divorce case in Los Angeles County Superior Court.
On that sum, they paid zero federal and state income tax. Jamie suggests that some tax breaks will apply this year too.
The McCourts have eight houses. Eight. Houses.
California is laying off teachers, closing parks, etc. — killing the state — just to protect the wealthiest and biggest corporations from paying their fair share of taxes. Millions of dollars in corporate contributions pay for the nasty smear campaigns — and all the lies about how the wealthy are "hurt" by taxes and will "leave the state" — all to protect THIS!
California needs to take a cold, hard look at the game-playing and the holes in our tax system that allow the rich to get away with paying less taxes than "the help" while at the same time we're telling teachers we can't afford to keep them teaching our kids.
And please, let's stop all this nonsense about "they'll just leave the state" if we try to make the wealthy and big corporations pay their fair share.
Click through to Speak Out California


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Angel Food Cupcakes.
I spent 21 minutes contemplating the idea that if I licked this whisk and it's three accompanying spatulas completely clean, I mean like COMPLETELY CLEAN… just exactly how sick could I get? Would the sickness be worth it? If I took my last breath slurping fluffy meringue and choked on raw egg whites, vanilla and sugar, would it be my IDEAL – like, total ideal – way to go?
Because there is a fine line between consuming batter and feeling like garbage (or uhhh… dying?), and I often cross it.
Actually… I always cross it. Repeatedly. Forever. Evermore.
I did that batter justice.
Really, in all my 20-something years on this Earth, if I have survived using six-years expired shaker Parmesan cheese from Mother Lovett's fridge, if my mom has baked a cake in 2012 with Duncan Hines mix that was good through March of '08 and I ate seven bajillion slices, if I lived after taking a swig of Dawn dish soap thinking it was my water bottle, if I consumed… well, let's be honest here – inhaled – a piece of coconut cream pie that I found in the back of the fridge behind some congealed substance that had basically grown legs and was waiting to walk away, well then…
… I don't think the base of an angel food cake is gonna kill me.
Oh! And especially not… because it's called ANGEL food cake, so there has to be like, angels involved somewhere. Watching over me. As in my guardian angel, which obviously has to have some involvement with cake somewhere.
If not, it's like they don't even… know me. And well, that's just not safe.
Besides one of my life goals being for George Clooney to prank me, another one is to make a mean-ass angel food cake. Mother Lovett used to make one and then top it with some glaze, and it was gooooood. Not my favorite, but every once in a while it was cool to bite down into a spongy layer of vanilla. Oh, but this was before I knew that angel food cake was basically a HEALTH FOOD. After learning that, I just wanted to eat brownies.
I made my first angel food cake a few years ago and assumed it would be soooosoo easy. Like, embarrassingly easy. I mean, it normally just looks like a plain, fluffy, fat life-size donut. It doesn't taste like tiramisu layered cheesecake with chocolate mouse filling and graham cracker crust and mascarpone frosting and fresh truffles on top of a bed of creme brulee and… and… yeah. Angel food cake is simple and light and people eat it so they can feel better about themselves ingesting cake. I didn't expect it to be all "beat the egg whites! watch for stiff peaks! sift the sugar! sift the sugar again! don't stir the egg whites! fold the stuff in! no, FOLD the stuff in! don't mix it in circles!" and stuff. I'm much more of a mix-all-this-junk-in-a-bowl-and-who-cares-when-you-add-the-dry-ingredients-and-oh-cracked-two-entire-eggs-plus-their-shells-in-the-batter?-just-scoop-it-out-with-your-fingers-and-move-on kind of person.
Needless to say, I was much more prepared for this angel food experience.
Still, I complicated things a little more and made some cupcakes instead, which ummm… might just be the best thing ever because you can pop them in your mouth like candy. They are everything that angel food cake is, but cuter.
Angel Food Cupcakes
[lightly adapted from mother lovett's recipe and gourmet]
makes 36 cupcakes
12 large egg whites (1 1/2 cups)
1 1/2 teaspoons cream of tarter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups sifted powdered sugar (sift before measuring)
1 1/8 cups sifted cake flour (sift before measuring)
1/4 teaspoon salt
Let egg whites sit at room temperature for about one hour before beginning. While eggs are resting, measure out powdered sugar and flour, then sift powdered sugar, flour and salt together. Set aside. Line a cupcake tin (or two) with cupcake liners.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and place rack in the bottom third of oven.
Using an electric mixer, beat egg whites until frothy. Once frothy, add in cream of tarter, then beat at medium speed until soft peaks form. This took me about 5-6 minutes. Gradually add granulated sugar with the mixer still on medium speed, continuing to beat until egg whites thicken a bit more with opaque, soft, droopy peaks. Once there, beat in vanilla extract.
Remove the bowl from the mixer and sprinkle 1/4 of the dry ingredients over the egg whites. Fold gently with a spatula until combined completely. Continue with the rest of the dry ingredients – I did this in three increments.
Once batter is smooth, use a 1/4 cup measure to pour heaping scoops of batter into each liner. Bake for 18-19 minutes, or until tops are golden brown. Let cool completely, then frost as desired. I frosted mine with a simple fresh vanilla whipped cream, using 1 pint of whipping cream, 2 tablespoons of sugar, 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, and beating until thickened.
Much cuter.


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No, not real birds! [Kyle] works in operations at a web company and needed a way to send alerts to his fellow coworkers, so he modified a flock of Audubon Society plush birds to respond to a Bluetooth beacon.
Using NRF24L01+ Bluetooth Low Energy modules, [Kyle] installed one each in these battery-powered singing birds. The devices are presumably powered off of the battery that comes with the birds, but the use of the BTLE module means the batteries won't discharge as rapidly.
[Kyle] also built an API that works over HTTP or IRC, which means that the employees in the office can activate everyone else's birds over a simple and intuitive interface. The birds can be activated one at a time, or all together in "panic" mode as one giant flock (in case of an emergency in the office). They can also be activated one at a time on a specific hour to simulate the Audubon Society's bird call clock.
He calls the device equail and it's a very unique notification system with a lot of applications. All of [Kyle]'s code and documentation of his project are available on his github site. He also used this primer on BTLE to get started, and this guide on sending data over BTLE to help get the project in the air.


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If you wish to join in the discussions or use the other advanced features available, you will need to register first. Registration is absolutely free and takes only a few minutes to complete so sign up today!
"came under the influence of the famous Shinto shaman Deguchi Onisaburo (1871-1948) and he developed a deep interest in ancient Shinto meditation techniques, especially kototama, as espoused by Motoori Norinaga (1730-1801), Kiyohara Michihisa, and other mystics." (p.74.)
「ところで、盛平が大正九年、三十七歳の折に出口王仁三郎との出会い(本文歴史之部の名章を参照)によって手ほどきされた以来、生涯ひたむきな関心を寄せつづけていたいわ ゆう「言霊学」は、記紀のころから言霊信仰として古神道の中心的課題であった「言霊」なる観念が、江戸期になって本居宣長(一七三○一八○一)をはじめ清原道旧その他の 国学者、宗教家(神道家)たちによって学問的対象化されたものである。」
"Furthermore, as the philologist par excellence of his age, Norinaga believed that words possessed more than simply literal or suggestive value. In particular, he was intrigued by special words called kotodama, spells or incantations which Norinaga and others believed capable of granting wishes and regarded as bridges' between the ordinary world of human affairs and the supernatural realm of numinous phenomena. The word kotodama had its locus classicus in one of the verses of the Man'yoshu, where it was suggested that kotodama were linked to the maintenance of the national weal, and Norinaga believed that kotodama had the power to transport one, at least on a spiritual level, from the sullied present to the divine age." (Nosco, 219-220.)
"Speaking in general, however, it may be said that the word kami signifies first the deities of heaven and earth who appear in the ancient records and the spirits of the shrines where they are worshipped. It is unnecessary to add that it includes birds and beasts, trees and plants, seas and mountains, and so forth. In ancient usage, anything whatsoever which was outside the ordinary, which possessed superior power or was awe-inspiring was called kami. Eminence here does not refer merely to the superiority of nobility, goodness, or meritorious deeds. Evil and mysterious things, if they are extraordinary and dreadful, are also called kami. Among human beings who are called kami, the successive generations of divine emperors are all included. The fact that emperors are also called totsu kami ("distant gods") is because, from the standpoint of common people, they are far-separated, majestic, and worthy of reverence. In lesser degree, we find in the present as well as in ancient times human beings who are kami. Although they may not be accepted as such throughout the country, yet in each province, village and family there are human beings who are kami, each one according to his own proper position. The kami of the divine age were for the most part human beings of that time, and, because the people of the time were all divine, it is called the divine age." (Motoori Norinaga, Kojiki-den, quoted in Nosco, Remembering Paradise, pp. 217-218; de Barry et al., Sources of Japanese Tradition, p. 18.)
"Your body is the creation of the universe, housing the spirit; your being is miraculously linked to the essence of the universein fact you are one with the universe and that should be the guiding principle of your life. The gift of life that has been bestowed on human beings dictates that they should guard and purify the world. They need to first develop perseverance, and then polish and clarify their thoughts. This will allow them to single-mindedly concentrate on the essential task of unifying mind and body." (Stevens, p. 80.)
"Aikido can reveal the grand design of the universe. It can bring all things to perfection through love. It can harmonize the Visible World, the Concealed World and the Divine World." (Stevens, p. 83.)
"The ten years around 1921 shall see the true beginning of the restoration of the world The third of March and the fifth of May 1921 are the decisive days. Till then, there will be trying times for Omoto." (Nadolski, p. 94.)
"A great war between Japan and the rest of the world will occur, and the kami will draw the warships and soldiers of the allied world near Japan. In the end the power of the kami will act and by such great upheavals as an eruption of Mt. Fujii and the vortex of a whirlpool of the Naruto Straits, all those forces will be utterly annihilated." (Nadolski, p. 95, quoted from Tokushige, Omoto Nanaju-nen-shi, I, p. 402.)
"Reverence for the Emperor and patriotism come from devotion to the deity, but this fact has become obscured in the minds of the ordinary citizens of our time. It must be restored as the foundation of our national life." "We must quickly reform our souls according to the Ofudesaki and return to the true essence of yamatodamashii."
Peter Goldsbury (b. 28 April 1944). Aikido 6th dan Aikikai, Professor at Hiroshima University, teaching philosophy and comparative culture. B. in UK. Began aikido as a student and practiced at various dojo. Became a student of Mitsunari Kanai at the New England Aikikai in 1973. After moving back to the UK in 1975, trained in the Ryushinkan Dojo under Minoru Kanetsuka. Also trained with K Chiba on his frequent visits to the UK. Moved to Hiroshima, Japan, in 1980 and continued training with the resident Shihan, Mazakazu Kitahira, 7th dan Also trained regularly with Seigo Yamaguchi, Hiroshi Tada, Sadateru Arikawa and Masatake Fujita, both in Hiroshima and at the Aikikai Hombu. Was elected Chairman of the IAF in 1998. With two German colleagues, opened a small dojo in Higashi-Hiroshima City in 2001. Instructed at Aiki Expo 2002 in Las Vegas, Nevada.


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NEW YORK – The new iPad model hitting stores Friday comes with several improvements over the original version but the same price tag, hobbling efforts by rivals at breaking Apple Inc.'s hold on the emerging market for tablet computers.
Competitors such as Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. can't seem to match the iPad's starting price of $499. Tablets that are comparable to the iPad in features cost hundreds of dollars more, while cheaper tablets are inferior to the iPad in quality.
Usually, the early products in consumer electronics, such as the first Blu-ray players or digital cameras, are expensive. Competition then gradually brings prices down. With the iPad, the reverse is happening, spelling trouble for competitors.
It's rare for prices to start low and stay low, yet it looks as if that's exactly what Apple intended. Apple appears to have chosen, right from the start, to make less of a profit from its iPads than it does from iPods and iPhones. That's an odd move for a company that isn't known for cheap products.
Apple's profit margin on the $499 entry-level iPad model is about 25 percent, according to an estimate by Toni Sacconaghi at Bernstein Research.
By contrast, the company's profit margin for all products, before corporate overhead, was 38.5 percent in the most recent quarter. He and other analysts estimate the margin for the iPhone 4 is 50 percent to 60 percent. (Apple charges about $600 for it, though it's cheaper in stores because wireless carriers subsidize it.)
Apple is telling investors to expect overall margins to keep declining, meaning competitors can't expect much of a reprieve.
There are cheaper tablet computers available, but they don't perform as well – with poor screens, poor touch sensitivity and poor software, and overall slowness. Archos sells a tablet that's roughly iPad-sized for $370. Reviewers at CNET and Laptop Magazine say its screen washes out unless you're right in front of it, and it has problems sensing touch.
A tablet that can match the iPad 2 in quality and features costs much more. For example, Motorola's Xoom sells for $800, or $600 if the buyer agrees to a two-year data service contract with Verizon Wireless. The iPad 2 with the same amount of memory – 32 gigabytes – and cellular data capability on AT&T's or Verizon's network costs $729, no contract required.
The Galaxy Tab from Samsung Electronics Co. is half the size of the iPad, yet costs $500. And that price is only available if the buyer pays an activation fee and signs up for at least one month of data service from Verizon, at a minimum total cost of $55. The tablet can be had for as little as $300, but that requires two years of data service, or hundreds of dollars in fees.
Some 100 different models of tablet computers have already gone on sale or are on the way. Gartner Inc. project that 65 million tablets will be sold worldwide this year, and analysts expect the bulk of them will be iPads. Apple sold 15 million of the original iPad in its first nine months on sale.
Analysts say Apple has a couple of advantages that let it sell an iPad profitably at a price that would put another manufacturer at break-even, or at a loss.
Apple sells about a third of iPads in its own stores and from its website. By cutting out the middleman, Apple is able to keep more of the slim profit margin for itself.
Also, the iPad uses many of the same chips as iPhone and iPods. That means Apple is able to buy them in huge quantities, bringing down costs. Wayne Lam at research firm IHS iSuppli estimates that Apple alone buys 20 percent to 25 percent of the world's production of flash memory chips, which go into phones, iPods, memory cards and the iPad.
Lam also speculates that Apple is using its clout and its cash to ensure supplies of another crucial component: touch-screen displays, which make up a large share of the tablet's cost.
Apple said in January that it had spent $3.9 billion on long-term contracts to secure supplies for the next two years of a "very strategic" component it wouldn't name. If Apple is indeed tying up a lot of the production capacity, competitors could have difficulties getting screens at a reasonable price. Apple did not immediately return a message to comment on that or its overall pricing strategy. Motorola also had no immediate comment.
Apple also designs its own processing chips to run iPad and the iPhone, based on blueprints it licenses from ARM Holdings Inc. For the Xoom, Motorola buys its main processing chip from Nvidia Corp., meaning there's one more vendor to pay.
One other factor is the software powering the tablet. The Xoom and other rivals generally use Google Inc.'s Android system, which Lam says demands more memory, raising the cost of the product. Apple's iPad software isn't as ambitious about "multitasking," or the ability to run more than one application at the same time, so it doesn't need as much memory.
In short, using Android forces iPad competitors to produce more expensive machines, Lam said. They might be able to bring component costs down by working closely with Google to optimize the software, but meeting the needs of a range of devices and companies is difficult. Because Apple controls its own software, it's a better position to tailor it to its own devices.
That adds up to very difficult math for competitors.
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Introducing Reedy's Ultra Rig: A New and Much Improved Version of the Flasher Rig!
Australia is a noisy democracy, but there are a few things we can all agree on: There's nothing more fun and exciting than fishing in Australia.
Fishing in Australia is a family activity, an excuse for everyone to get together – Mom, Dad and the kids. Grandma can join in too! Reedy's Rigz makes high quality fishing gear and equipment for the whole family.
Yes, our pre-tied fishing rigs are just as useful to the professionals as they are to recreational fishers or those who enjoy fishing as a hobby or a sport.
Our Paternoster rigs such as the Flasher Rig are easy to use, highly effective and guaranteed to catch fish in their dozens, no matter which method you use or where you fish, on a boat, or on land.
Reedy's Rigz is one of the most trusted and family friendly fishing brands in Australia. If you have purchased our fishing rigs before, you already know how good they are. If you haven't already, well, what are you waiting for!
We believe in constant and continuous improvement, and we are happy to announce that the launch of a brand new fishing rig, by far the best fishing rig on the market, the Reedy's Ultra Rig!
Introducing Reedy's Ultra Rig
Reedy's Ultra Rigz is a new and advanced type of fishing rig. It is a pre-tied, Paternoster rig that uses UV fibre and glows in the dark.
What's a Paternoster Rig?
Reedy's Ultra Rig is tied in a Paternoster formation. Using Paternoster rigs is one of the best long distance methods for catching fish. You can also use this method mid-range from close-in.
A Paternoster Rig such as Reedy's Ultra Rigz has two main parts: One that has the lead attached and the other that has the hook attached. The main purpose of this rig is to offer as little resistance as possible to the fish, just as it moves off the bait.
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